SPEAKER_00: If you have a Bible with you, let me invite you to turn to Daniel 7.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I remember years ago I was doing a uh teaching through Revelation and uh told somebody that was what I was doing.
SPEAKER_00: And his response to the apocalyptic section of the Bible was, did you scare them?
SPEAKER_00: Well, no, no, I don't think that's really what it's about.
SPEAKER_00: I I showed them Jesus, and Jesus wins, and that's the point of apocalypse.
SPEAKER_00: Uh when we when we hear the word apocalypse, what we think about is zombies and uh earthquakes, aliens, you know, big floods, uh all those kinds of things.
SPEAKER_00: But the word apocalypse comes from the Greek word meaning to just take the cover off and to show what's inside.
SPEAKER_00: It means to reveal.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the last book of the uh Bible, people will say it it's the book of Apocalypse, the Apocalypse of John.
SPEAKER_00: But what it means is the revelation.
SPEAKER_00: God is showing us things and in words that we may uh not have thought to express them, but but it goes past our kind of rational minds into our souls so that we can feel it and what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: And I want that to happen for you as we're reading through this passage, is to feel what's taking place.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's taking place in the passage is uh there's a shift in Daniel.
SPEAKER_00: In the first six chapters, it's largely historical, and it's about the life of Daniel living in the kingdom of King Nebuchadnezzar and then of King Belshazzar.
SPEAKER_00: And various miraculous things happen.
SPEAKER_00: He interprets dreams.
SPEAKER_00: There's Daniel and the lions, then where God protected him from the uh the deadly uh feline.
SPEAKER_00: And uh Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were in the flaming furnace of fire, and they survived, and there's one like a son of man who's walking in the midst.
SPEAKER_00: Gee, I wonder who that was.
SPEAKER_00: And uh, so there are these miraculous things, so that by the time you get to this passage, which actually backs up in time to King Belshazzar.
SPEAKER_00: So this didn't take place chronologically after Daniel and the lion's den.
SPEAKER_00: This is back to King Belshazzar.
SPEAKER_00: And what's going on is we know Daniel receives revelations, Daniel interprets revelations, and so when we look at the book of Daniel, chapter seven and following, we recognize this is from God.
SPEAKER_00: These weren't bad mushrooms in the middle of the night for Daniel.
SPEAKER_00: This was God revealing these things to him.
SPEAKER_00: There's a quote from John Barton about reading uh biblical apocalyptic literature.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Biblical apocalyptic is a revelation of the ending of this present age, which is an age characterized by conflict, and it's replacement by the final age of peace.
SPEAKER_00: It shows us ahead of time the end of the kingdom of this world and the replacement by the kingdom of our God and of his Christ.
SPEAKER_00: This revelation is unfolded in complex and mysterious imagery and has the purpose of comforting and exhorting the faithful.
SPEAKER_00: So it's not just informing us, it's transforming us, it's changing us from the inside out.
SPEAKER_00: So in apocalyptic literature, God is revealing the big picture that nothing can change, heal, or save the world other than the coming of the reign of Jesus, the judgment and removal of all evil, and a new heavens and a new earth.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus will come and do it, and that is the theme throughout all apocalyptic literature, and that is the theme of Daniel 7.
SPEAKER_00: So, if you're willing and able, let me invite you to stand as we read God's word in Daniel 7.
SPEAKER_00: In the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel saw a dream and visions in his head as he lay in his bed.
SPEAKER_00: Then he wrote down the dream and told the sum of the matter.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel declared, I saw in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea, and four great beasts came up out of the sea different from one another.
SPEAKER_00: The first was like a lion, and had eagle's wings.
SPEAKER_00: Then, as I looked, its wings were plucked off, and it was lifted up from the ground and made to stand on two feet like a man, and the mind of a man was given to it.
SPEAKER_00: And behold, another beast, a second one, like a bear, it was raised up on one side.
SPEAKER_00: It had three ribs in its mouth between its teeth, and it was told, Arise, devour much flesh.
SPEAKER_00: After this I looked, and behold, another, like a leopard, with four wings of a bird on its back, and the beast had four heads, and dominion was given to it.
SPEAKER_00: After this I saw in the next visions, and behold, a fourth beast, terrifying and dreadful, and exceedingly strong.
SPEAKER_00: It had great iron teeth, it devoured and broken pieces and stamped what was left with its feet.
SPEAKER_00: It was different from all the beasts that were before it, and it had ten horns.
SPEAKER_00: I considered the horns, and behold, there came up among them another horn, a little one, before which three of the first horns were plucked up by the roots.
SPEAKER_00: And behold, in this horn were eyes, like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking great things.
SPEAKER_00: As I looked, thrones were placed, and the ancient of days took his seat, his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool.
SPEAKER_00: His throne was fiery flames, its wheels were burning fire, a stream of fire issued and came out from before him, a thousand thousands served him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him.
SPEAKER_00: The court sat in judgment, and the books were opened.
SPEAKER_00: I looked then because the sound of the great words that the horn was speaking, and as I looked, the beast was killed, its body destroyed, and given over to be burned with fire.
SPEAKER_00: As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was taken away, but their lives were prolonged for a season and a time.
SPEAKER_00: I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him, and to him was given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him.
SPEAKER_00: His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.
SPEAKER_00: As for me, Daniel, my spirit within me was anxious, and the visions of my head alarmed me.
SPEAKER_00: I approached one of those who stood there and asked him the truth concerning all this.
SPEAKER_00: So he told me and made known to me the interpretation of the things.
SPEAKER_00: These four great beasts are four kings who shall arise out of the earth, but the saints of the most high shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom forever, forever and ever.
SPEAKER_00: Then I desired to know the truth about the fourth beast, which was different from all the rest, exceedingly terrifying, with its teeth of iron and claws of bronze, and which devoured and broken pieces and stamped what was left with its feet, and about the ten horns that were on its head, and the other horn that came up, and before which three of them fell, the horn that had eyes and a mouth that spoke great things, and that seemed greater than its companions.
SPEAKER_00: As I looked, this horn made war with the saints, and prevailed over them, until the ancient of days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High, and the time came when the saints possessed the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Thus he said, As for the fourth beast, there shall be a fourth kingdom on the earth, which shall be different from all the kingdoms, and it shall devour the whole earth, and trample it down and break it to pieces.
SPEAKER_00: As for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings shall arise, and another shall arise after them.
SPEAKER_00: He shall be different from the former ones, and shall put down three kings.
SPEAKER_00: He shall speak words against the most high, and shall wear out the saints of the most high, and shall think to change the times and the law, and they shall be given to his hand for a time, times, and half a time.
SPEAKER_00: But the court shall sit in judgment, and his dominion shall be taken away, to be consumed and destroyed to the end, and the kingdom and the dominion and greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.
SPEAKER_00: His kingdom shall be an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the end of the matter.
SPEAKER_00: As for me, Daniel, my thoughts greatly alarmed me, and my color changed, but I kept the matter in my heart.
SPEAKER_00: Well, of course, his thoughts greatly alarmed him, and probably yours greatly alarm you.
SPEAKER_00: So let me pray and ask God to bless us as we open this up.
SPEAKER_00: This is language we're not used to, Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We don't talk really this way.
SPEAKER_00: We're used to all kinds of crazy and scary images on our shows and movies that we watch and our books that we read.
SPEAKER_00: But this has a deeper purpose and deeper meaning.
SPEAKER_00: It's tied to a reality that is going on around us that has happened in the past and will continue into the future.
SPEAKER_00: And so we pray that you and your wisdom and grace would direct us now as we consider what this means for us.
SPEAKER_00: We pray that all that we say and think or our time together would be pleasing to you, would be directed by you, and would be used by you to bless your people and to bring those who have questions to a greater assurance.
SPEAKER_00: Would you bless us and be with us?
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, would you bless me?
SPEAKER_00: I'm handling not just holy things but mysterious things.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I've tried to put it in a package that I can fathom and understand.
SPEAKER_00: But there's more here, and I pray that you would direct and guide us, at least in what we're talking about in this room, and give us even greater knowledge outside.
SPEAKER_00: Bless me.
SPEAKER_00: The weak one who stands in front and proclaims truth.
SPEAKER_00: Bless us, we pray, in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I don't remember.
SPEAKER_00: I Rebecca will tell you my memory's going, so I can't remember if I've told the story or when I've told I've told it, but I don't know when.
SPEAKER_00: Uh years ago doing campus ministry, we had a movie night.
SPEAKER_00: We had about 30 or 45 students in our house.
SPEAKER_00: We had a big wooden door, and then we had a storm door, just a glass door.
SPEAKER_00: And so we close, we opened the big wooden door, had the glass door open so people could see they could just come on in.
SPEAKER_00: And Katie did not know that uh there was a storm door.
SPEAKER_00: And so we were just beginning the movie, and when we heard a shatter as she hit the glass, glass and blood went everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: And so everybody just stops what we're doing.
SPEAKER_00: We run out to the foyer, and there's she is in the middle, hands and knees, shorts, hands, and she says, Al.
SPEAKER_00: And so we got her to the hospital.
SPEAKER_00: So I got uh we had a couple of nursing students, they got in my car with me.
SPEAKER_00: Um, we drove to the hospital and uh, you know, called her parents, all of these kind of things.
SPEAKER_00: And uh so we got, she was okay, she had stitches, she got healed up, it was good.
SPEAKER_00: And but when I got back to the house, I saw that you know there was no blood, there was no glass anywhere because our students, well, we had engineering students and others who went out and they found a way of like detecting where all the blood was using lights and things, and so they just scrubbed, cleaned up all the glass, got everything cleaned up, and they got the house healed up.
SPEAKER_00: So Katie got healed up, the house got healed up, and if you can understand that, you can understand Daniel 7.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that fantastic?
SPEAKER_00: So, what happens in this passage is that he's giving us uh the world's story is that yes, Jesus came to redeem individual people from our sins because we are bloody, we're bruised, we're broken, we're sinful, we need a redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: And so Jesus has come to redeem individual people.
SPEAKER_00: But there are places like this when we're getting more of the big pictures.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus did not just come to redeem individual people, he came to redeem the world.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a world redemption passage that we're looking at.
SPEAKER_00: He's doing something bigger.
SPEAKER_00: We recognize, yes, Stephen speaks needs redemption.
SPEAKER_00: I need to be remade.
SPEAKER_00: But the world also needs redemption and needs to be remade.
SPEAKER_00: And we know this.
SPEAKER_00: We know that we need both.
SPEAKER_00: If you've looked at the headlines this morning, you know that we need both.
SPEAKER_00: New York Times, U.S.
SPEAKER_00: and Iran failed to agree on a peace deal.
SPEAKER_00: War is in our headlines.
SPEAKER_00: It always has been in the headlines.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to this quote.
SPEAKER_00: In the last 300 years, there have been 386 wars in Europe.
SPEAKER_00: And since the year 1500, 8,000 known peace treaties have been signed.
SPEAKER_00: Each one was signed with the intention that it should last forever, but the average length of each was a little over two years.
SPEAKER_00: Right now, 2026, there are 120 armed conflicts taking place worldwide.
SPEAKER_00: At least the internet tells me that, so it's got to be true.
SPEAKER_00: Um and this the internet also tells me this a significant majority of the world's population lives under regimes with restricted freedoms, about 70%.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't know how they define restricted freedoms, but you can look it up.
SPEAKER_00: With some figures suggesting that around 39% live under outright authoritarian rule.
SPEAKER_00: Does that feel right as you listen to the news and as you study the world?
SPEAKER_00: It might.
SPEAKER_00: And into our modern anxieties, this passage speaks confidence, peace, and hope in what God has planned, because he tells us no evils will last, no regimes remain, in the end they will all turn to dust and blow away, and the permanent glory, peace, prosperity, joy of God's kingdom will be our landscape.
SPEAKER_00: It will be our home, it will be all that we see.
SPEAKER_00: Now, uh I know all of us are curious mainly about the monstrosities here.
SPEAKER_00: They get a lot of press in this passage.
SPEAKER_00: What are they?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to spend a lot of time here, but I want to point out a few things.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 7, verse 23, pointing out, it's showing us that these carnivorous, predatory monstrosities are actually representing kings and kingdoms.
SPEAKER_00: Oppressive, wicked, violent political governmental systems who exert power to benefit themselves at the expense of others.
SPEAKER_00: And it's saying you're either part of the system or you're prey to the system, but you, as an individual person, are not going to be able to stop that.
SPEAKER_00: Because evil is not just located in the individual human heart, it is found in human systems where people get together.
SPEAKER_00: And commentators tell us who specifically who these, oh, four, who these four uh monstrosities are.
SPEAKER_00: Looking at world history and seeing that during the time between Daniel and the time of Christ, uh, this matches up really well with four kingdoms that arose.
SPEAKER_00: One, and this is what you see, the eagle lion that he talked about represents Babylon.
SPEAKER_00: And when the the uh the eagle lion loses his wings and gets pulled up and is stood up like a man, that's Nebuchadnezzar because at some point he appears to have been converted and become more human-like rather than a predator.
SPEAKER_00: And then the humpback bear refers to the Medes and the Persians.
SPEAKER_00: The four-headed leopard bird is Greece, and the wings represent the speed with which Alexander the Great took over what was for them the known world.
SPEAKER_00: So by the age of 32, he had conquered the known world, and you can go look at that on in just in world history.
SPEAKER_00: And then the terrifying iron-toothed seven-headed foot stomper is Rome.
SPEAKER_00: And that one little horn that's talked about here is tied by most commentators to a person by the name of Antiochus Epiphanes.
SPEAKER_00: And we're probably going to talk a little bit more about that next week.
SPEAKER_00: So get ready for that.
SPEAKER_00: Um so the idea that all of these great nations and empires being portrayed as predators, it's showing us a truth about the world.
SPEAKER_00: Utopian dreams are pipe dreams.
SPEAKER_00: They're not going to happen because we live in a fallen and broken world.
SPEAKER_00: And anytime there is some sort of uh reform that may stave it off over time, that's God in his providence putting a halt to things and slowing things down for a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: But until Jesus comes back, we're not going to have the world of the kingdom of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to happen.
SPEAKER_00: So these monsters get some time in this passage, but they're not really the main point.
SPEAKER_00: The main point is all of these things are going on between before verses 13 and 14, the monsters, the monstrosities.
SPEAKER_00: After verses 13 and 14, the monstrosities.
SPEAKER_00: But in the middle, there's a contrast because someone shows up.
SPEAKER_00: He's not a monstrosity.
SPEAKER_00: He's not a ravenous beast.
SPEAKER_00: He's one like a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where we're going to spend our time this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so diving in, you can follow along as I'm talking up here.
SPEAKER_00: A scene unfolds in Daniel 7.9.
SPEAKER_00: We've met the monstrosities.
SPEAKER_00: But a scene unfolds in Daniel 7.9.
SPEAKER_00: A tribunal is convened to judge these four kingdoms, and by extension, all the kingdoms.
SPEAKER_00: Chairs are set, the ancient of days, God Himself presides.
SPEAKER_00: And God, the Ancient of Days, wears white robes, which refers to his holiness and his righteous deeds, his moral purity.
SPEAKER_00: His white hair doesn't mean he lives in the villages.
SPEAKER_00: His white hair means that he has eternal wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: He knows everything.
SPEAKER_00: His fiery throne refers to his justice.
SPEAKER_00: His throne with the wheels of fire, it's not like a, you know, really fast wheelchair.
SPEAKER_00: It's referring to the fact that he's on a mission to eradicate all the evils and the wickedness of the world.
SPEAKER_00: He's on a mission.
SPEAKER_00: His throne is active, not passive when it comes to things.
SPEAKER_00: Justice will be served.
SPEAKER_00: He's purifying the earth.
SPEAKER_00: And from his throne comes just verdicts.
SPEAKER_00: And then in Daniel 7.10, the court sits down and books are opened.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing is redacted, nothing is sealed, everything's revealed and judged.
SPEAKER_00: There are no plea deals.
SPEAKER_00: The stream of fire refers to the complete eradication of evil.
SPEAKER_00: He's removing it.
SPEAKER_00: So God's intent is to remove all sin and its sources and to set up something much, much better.
SPEAKER_00: Here's a quote.
SPEAKER_00: I think it's have it maybe written.
SPEAKER_00: God is utterly committed, utterly committed to set the world right in the end.
SPEAKER_00: This doctrine, like that of the resurrection itself, is held firmly in place by the belief in God as creator on the one side, and the belief in his goodness on the other.
SPEAKER_00: And that setting right must necessarily involve the elimination of all that distorts God, God's good and lovely creation, and particularly of all that defaces his image-bearing human creatures.
SPEAKER_00: Not to put too fine a point on it, there will be no barbed wire in the kingdom of God, and those whose whole being has been dependent upon barbed wire will have no place there either.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's the scene.
SPEAKER_00: And then if you notice, when we picked up in verses 13 and 14, it seems to be changing the channel or changing the scene a little bit, and we get a different scene.
SPEAKER_00: So that's the judgment that's taking place.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel 7, 13 to 14, the tribunal becomes a coronation, becomes a reception, it becomes an inauguration.
SPEAKER_00: The Son of Man arrives, he's presented before the ancient of days, he's foundworthy and given all dominion over everything.
SPEAKER_00: So Daniel 7, 13 to 14, if you've got a Bible, read along.
SPEAKER_00: Hopefully it's on the screen.
SPEAKER_00: I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the cloud of heaven, clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: And he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him.
SPEAKER_00: And to him, the son of man, was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him.
SPEAKER_00: His dominion, the son of man, is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: If you've read the New Testament, the Gospels, you know that Jesus refers to himself throughout as the Son of Man.
SPEAKER_00: And there are times when people read that and say, well, you know, Jesus is saying he's just a man like you and me.
SPEAKER_00: No, he isn't.
SPEAKER_00: This is a divine figure.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews in the first century knew that this was a divine phrase, but it also is another phrase, it's used of Ezekiel, too.
SPEAKER_00: So in their colloquial phrases, in their modern parlance, their parlance at the time, Ezekiel was called a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: It just meant mere mortal.
SPEAKER_00: But this is recognizably somebody different because he's coming with the clouds, he's like a son of man, and he receives worship and service.
SPEAKER_00: Like I don't know if you noticed, but it talked about all nations, people, and languages should serve him.
SPEAKER_00: That's verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of your translations have used NIV, it says the word worship.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you, ESV says serve.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason is because those two things and that phrase, that word in Aramaic, has both those connotations in it.
SPEAKER_00: Like when we came here this morning, are you here for service or worship?
SPEAKER_00: It's like, well, yeah, we're here for a worship service.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the kind of thing he's talking about.
SPEAKER_00: So this one like a son of man is receiving worship, and it's at God's doing.
SPEAKER_00: So what else do we see here about this identity that it's it's more than a man?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Ezekiel is said to be a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: So I actually looked at it in the original language to see what's going on here.
SPEAKER_00: Did we just add like a son of man?
SPEAKER_00: And we didn't.
SPEAKER_00: That's actually in the original text, which says that one like a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: There's a preposition or a prefix on the word son of man, and that's why they translate it as like a son of man, which means there's more than meets the eye.
SPEAKER_00: He's not just a mere human, there's something else that's going on.
SPEAKER_00: One of those things that's going on is that he's arriving in the clouds.
SPEAKER_00: He came with the clouds of heaven.
SPEAKER_00: So coming in the clouds was a stocked image from that time period to refer to the arrival of deity.
SPEAKER_00: Clouds were referring to the vehicle of God.
SPEAKER_00: It's like God is showing up in his limousine.
SPEAKER_00: And he's the only one who rides in this limousine.
SPEAKER_00: He's the only one who rides in the clouds.
SPEAKER_00: So when the it's used four times in the Old Testament, only of Yahweh riding in the clouds.
SPEAKER_00: Except here, it says that this figure, one like a son of man, he comes with the clouds.
SPEAKER_00: He comes in the limousine.
SPEAKER_00: And so then in 713, the Son of Man is presented before the Ancient of Days.
SPEAKER_00: He's assessed, he's affirmed, he's confirmed.
SPEAKER_00: And the time is now right for him to take his throne.
SPEAKER_00: And it says the Ancient of Days gave him everything: dominion, he's got control.
SPEAKER_00: Anything he decrees is enacted and it's enforced.
SPEAKER_00: He has that kind of authority.
SPEAKER_00: He has glory and status, he's the highest rank.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone listens to him, and he's been given a kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: He's got the deed to the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: He has the keys, he has the deed, it belongs to him, the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: So this is Jesus in the midst of all of this.
SPEAKER_00: Now, it doesn't say what the assessment is.
SPEAKER_00: When the beasts, this ravenous, monstrous beast, are they assessed, they are removed from power.
SPEAKER_00: Their dominion is taken away.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus is assessed, he's given permanent authority, permanent power forever.
SPEAKER_00: But it doesn't give us what the verdict was, does it?
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't actually say what it was.
SPEAKER_00: So you poke around a little bit in the rest of the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: And one of my favorite places where I think this is pointing us to is the transfiguration of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Where one like a son of man shows himself to be one like a son of God, and the voice of the Almighty speaks, and he gives the verdict.
SPEAKER_00: This is my son whom I love, with whom I'm well pleased.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to him, because I've given him all authority.
SPEAKER_00: This is Jesus in this passage.
SPEAKER_00: And he's given this unending authority, this unending.
SPEAKER_00: So one like a son of man has come.
SPEAKER_00: And so when Jesus is referring to himself throughout the New Testament as Son of Man, he's saying, Not I'm merely human, he's saying, Yeah, I am human, but I'm also the Son of God in the flesh, coming to redeem a people for myself.
SPEAKER_00: And this is fantastic news.
SPEAKER_00: It's incredibly good news because Jesus has been given all the authority to shape the world as he sees fit.
SPEAKER_00: He and he has an agenda that he's working out, and it's glorious.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I don't, this is not a conversation about Trump.
SPEAKER_00: We're not going there, just not gonna do that.
SPEAKER_00: You may like Trump, you may not like Trump, but he's the president, and that means he has been given authority to work out whatever his agenda is over this four-year period.
SPEAKER_00: But there's a term limit, right?
SPEAKER_00: At the end, he's done, four years.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has no term limits, and he gets to work out whatever his will is for the rest of eternity throughout all time.
SPEAKER_00: And this is fantastic because of who Jesus is.
SPEAKER_00: He's told us who he is.
SPEAKER_00: We see his agenda.
SPEAKER_00: So in Luke chapter 19, verse 10, we read this for the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost.
SPEAKER_00: He's looking for the lost and the broken and the wandering.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew 20, 28.
SPEAKER_00: The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus came to die so his people could be free.
SPEAKER_00: That's his agenda.
SPEAKER_00: Luke 5, 24.
SPEAKER_00: But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, he said to the man who was paralyzed, I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.
SPEAKER_00: To heal, to rescue, to redeem us.
SPEAKER_00: But he's also come with the mindset of redeeming and rescuing the whole world.
SPEAKER_00: To redeem the world, the creation of God.
SPEAKER_00: The monstrosities that we are looking at, they build kingdoms on the backs of their people.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus built his kingdom by winning his people back.
SPEAKER_00: The monstrosities conscripted and took children to make them soldiers and slaves, and Jesus took soldiers and slaves and made them children of God.
SPEAKER_00: The monstrosities built their kingdom by taking lives.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus built his kingdom by giving his life.
SPEAKER_00: He's somebody completely different.
SPEAKER_00: Because the ravenous monstrosities have these appetites that they can't fill unless they can get it from somebody else.
SPEAKER_00: I need this from the world around me.
SPEAKER_00: I need power, I need money, I need accolades, I need something.
SPEAKER_00: There's this insatiable desire in them that leads them to faulty thinking, deluded thinking, and to constantly compare themselves to one another.
SPEAKER_00: It's from the inside.
SPEAKER_00: It's from the inside of individuals, it's from the inside of whole systems.
SPEAKER_00: This is what Dane Ortland says about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: About Jesus, we cannot fathom the sheer purity, holiness, cleanness of his mind and heart.
SPEAKER_00: The simplicity, the innocence, the loveliness.
SPEAKER_00: He's not a predator.
SPEAKER_00: He loves his people.
SPEAKER_00: His desire is for people to be blessed and to glorify his heavenly father.
SPEAKER_00: He's the one who gives his life to rescue his people.
SPEAKER_00: So what's the verdict based on?
SPEAKER_00: When he shows up here in Daniel, God assesses him and he's giving him all the dominion and authority.
SPEAKER_00: What's it based on?
SPEAKER_00: Well, here's another one from the New Testament that talks about why God would do this for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: This is in Philippians 2, verses 5 and following.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be held on to grasp, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant.
SPEAKER_00: And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore God exalted him.
SPEAKER_00: Did you catch that?
SPEAKER_00: Because he gave himself, God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
SPEAKER_00: So Daniel 7 is a preview.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel 7 is a promise.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel 7 is a guarantee to say that Jesus sits on the throne.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the linchpin there.
SPEAKER_00: If we've talked about the golden thread that's pulled all the way through the whole Bible, from the Genesis chapter 3, promising Jesus coming all the way to the end of the Bible, Revelation 22, and when all is said and done, right here in the middle of Daniel, Daniel 7, that golden thread is tied into a sweet little bow.
SPEAKER_00: So we can see this is significant.
SPEAKER_00: And I would challenge you to one to go read the uh channel.
SPEAKER_00: It sounds like I try to throw it down the gauntlet.
SPEAKER_00: You go read.
SPEAKER_00: It might be helpful for you to go and read, uh, just do an online search for the Son of Man passages in the Gospels, and just go read those and see the heart of our Savior, to see the heart of Jesus, and then you know, go elsewhere for that.
SPEAKER_00: But this is a promise and it's a guarantee for us.
SPEAKER_00: And a big part of faith in this passage, like he's not talking here necessarily about the redemption of us as individual people.
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about the redemption of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And part of faith, part of faith is in Jesus is saying, I'm so glad Jesus is the one to do this.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad the kingdom's been given to him because he's the only one who could set things right.
SPEAKER_00: It's a big part, a big part of saying, I want the world to be shaped by Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: I want him to be king.
SPEAKER_00: So what he's telling us is do not be discouraged.
SPEAKER_00: God is sending the King of Kings, the help of helps to the world.
SPEAKER_00: And these kingdoms and governments are all temporary, all of them.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus' kingdom is forever and his influence.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's telling us is that the royal family loves you and wants you to be in with them.
SPEAKER_00: I was digging through my notes for a previous sermons about illustrations that I can help us to understand that somebody who is regal and royal would want us that we're not in their lives.
SPEAKER_00: And there's a story for that.
SPEAKER_00: Queen Elizabeth passed away a few years ago, and this is a story that somebody told during that.
SPEAKER_00: And uh, every legislative session begins with began with a visit from the queen.
SPEAKER_00: It's a very regal tradition.
SPEAKER_00: She wears her crown, her robe, or she processed down a hallway lined with the queen's guard, who took their swords and they would strike the stone walls as she was walking, and it would create these sparks, this kind of like magical effect as the queen is walking down the hallways.
SPEAKER_00: And the hallway ended at the House of Lords, where the queen entered to take her seat on the throne and essentially commissions the legislature, legislators to enact the will of the people.
SPEAKER_00: Several years ago, uh, as she was getting older, they were forced to break that tradition.
SPEAKER_00: And so instead of going up the stairs and then going down the hall, she would actually ride an elevator and go up because she was getting older.
SPEAKER_00: And uh the first year that they did this, uh, there was a mistake made because the lift operator, I guess that's all he does all day, every day, is run the Queen's elevator.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, he pressed the wrong button and it went down, not it went up, not up to the House of Lords, it went to the maintenance floor.
SPEAKER_00: The door opened, and this maintenance worker named Alice, not even lifting up her head, just pushed her cart onto the elevator and pinned Queen Elizabeth to the back of the elevator.
SPEAKER_00: The door's closed.
SPEAKER_00: Alice looks up and sees the Queen and let an expletive fly.
SPEAKER_00: And everything went still until the Queen of England started with uncontrollable laughter.
SPEAKER_00: And then the most remarkable invitation.
SPEAKER_00: Because as the lift worker was, you know, opening the door, she said, don't, let's just ride it out.
SPEAKER_00: So she rode up to where her soldiers were waiting as they got off.
SPEAKER_00: And so off of the elevator came Queen Elizabeth and her royal regalia, and Alice, the maintenance worker, with her tray.
SPEAKER_00: And they're walking down the hallway together.
SPEAKER_00: And then something else happened is Queen Elizabeth started a tradition where every year Alice would come to Buckingham Palace for high tea with the Queen.
SPEAKER_00: You would never expect that, would you?
SPEAKER_00: Would you expect that the elevator would open and you'd be face to face with royalty and that you'd be brought not just into the elevator but into that person's life?
SPEAKER_00: How about the family?
SPEAKER_00: You'd be brought into the family of God.
SPEAKER_00: This is in 1 Thessalonians 4, 16 to 17.
SPEAKER_00: For the Lord himself, Jesus Himself, will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of the archangel, with the sound of the trumpet of God.
SPEAKER_00: This is at the end.
SPEAKER_00: And the dead in Christ will rise first.
SPEAKER_00: Then we who are alive who are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We're going, God's going to send the family limousine for us and pick us up and take us home.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying here, I've come to redeem the world.
SPEAKER_00: And I've come to redeem you.
SPEAKER_00: Because I want that world I'm remaking to be inhabited with my people that I love, my sheep, my children, my friends.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to be there.
SPEAKER_00: So what's Daniel 7 about?
SPEAKER_00: Lots of charts about the future and what's going to take place?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: One man, one savior, one king, the Redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: Come on and pray for us.